Many coaches struggle with fresh ideas for youth basketball plays. Here is one suggestion that has works very well. Give it a try!
From John…
Out of Bounds Play
We taught the kids this basketball play back in 3rd grade but two years later it’s still working. It’s another version of the Stack play and the reason it works is because it plays right into the philosophy of youth rule #1 on defense “stay between your man and the basket”.
Out of bounds under your own basket, the players line up in a stack with the first man in the line starting on the box in front of the man taking the basketball out. Typically the 4 defenders of the stack will all line up on the basket side of the stack. On “break” the first man in line jumps out of the stack towards the corner and either puts his hand out looking for the pass or actually calls out the name of the man taking the ball out. If he feels the defender follow him out of the stack he immediately turns and runs around the stack and cuts hard to the basket.
You’ll be amazed how often he’ll be wide open for a lay up. The other 3 kids in the stack don’t move until the first guy has run around the back of the stack. Then the 2nd man cuts to the corner (ball side), the 3rd man takes one step forward looking for a lob pass and the 4th man steps backward so we have a man back on D. After you do this basketball drill a few times the defender of the first man in the stack will stop following him through and will wait on the other side of the stack for him to run around it. Now when the first man jumps out of the stack and doesn’t feel the defender following him he’ll be wide open for a short shot.